Hot Curl – La Jolla, WindanSea Shack Icon
Written by mac meda on September 1, 2009 – 3:00 am -
Windansea cultural icon Hot Curl shares a beer with Jeff Mullus and Jack
The story of Hot Curl first starts like this: Hot Curl was a cartoon character created in 1963 by Michael Dormer and Lee Teacher.
- In 1963, Dormer and his friend, Lee Teacher, sculpted Hot Curl, a 400-pound concrete statue, and installed it on the rocks near the surf shack at La Jolla’s famed Windansea Beach in San Diego, California.
- The sculpture of a mop-haired, 6-foot tall, knobby-kneed surfer gazed out at the sea with a beer in his hand.
- The pot-bellied surf god quickly became a nationwide sensation appearing in SurfToons comics and as a plastic model kit, selling hundreds of thousands of copies.
In 1964, Hot Curl became a movie star, appearing in Muscle Beach Party (1964), a cult classic starring Frankie Avalon, Annette Funicello, Buddy Hackett, Don Rickles, and Morey Amsterdam, among others, and featuring the first film appearance of “Little” Stevie Wonder.
Well, lets read between the lines on this story; it was not all that easy for Hot Curl to get his claim to fame. At first, Hot Curl was threatened by the City of San Diego when they wanted it removed. They called it unappropriated for the community. You know the morality issue. Then they added, “It was built and installed without proper building permits,” - the typical excuse, bureaucrat BS.
So how did Mike’s cartoon character get its fame?
Well, you can thank La Jollans, surfers, beach goers, Mac Meda, and activists when they revolted, protested, and organized a “Save Hot Curl,” campaign. Remember, this was the start of the 1960s, a time of cultural change and protests.
The protest drew nation wide attention and was featured in surfing and underground publication and even the conservative San Diego Union questioned the city’s BS. Finally the city caved in, made some stipulations (like adding a good concrete base etc) and Hot Curl was allow to flaunt his beer guzzling pot belly at Windansea.
Gee, thank guys!
Unfortunately, Hot Curl became the victim of vandals (Mac Meda put out a contract to find the perpetrator(s) or else) and later, it was finally destroyed by a large surf day. For a long time, just the concrete base with a couple of bars of rebar was the only remembrance of the revered icon.
However, Mac Meda did not let it rest and was the first to flaunt a replica (believed to be from one of the movies) of the surfing icon (before La Jolla Parade organizers banned their entry) during the La Jolla Christmas Parade, which it continues to this day rides proud on floats that support WindanSea.
Tags: events, mac-tales
Posted in Meda People, Meda Rant and Rave | 2 Comments »
By Michael Flanagan on Oct 26, 2009 | Reply
I have a plastic model of Hot Curl still in the box wrapped up and I believe it is #100. Can you tell me where to find a value for this
By Chris Sutton on Nov 30, 2011 | Reply
I lived at the corner of LJ BLVD and Winamar untill 1972. my older brother was one of not old enough for the lot kids hanging out at the pump house when Tom Wolfe stopped by. He said the made up the craziest stuff they could think of in answer to his questions. After Hot Curl was gone, there was just the feet with rebar on top of the round base. Then the feet were gone, and there was just footprints in the base. I used to stand there with my little feet in the big footprints….
So, a few years ago this cartoon about a surfing penguin comes out, his hero is a legendary surfer named BIG Z.
When the young penguin gets to the beach where BIG Z died during a surf contest. There is a round disk on the rocks, with 2 big webfoot prints in it, and the name BIG Z. The young penguin steps into the big web prints. The person that put that into the script must be my age and grown up at Windansea. I thought I was the only person that remembered Hot Curl like that…..
The summer after Hot Curl was created, installed, and dissapeared, my family visited relatives on the east coast. in a small beach town 5 n dime, were plastic models of Hot Curl. To me, at 5 years old the world seemed suddenly small, and La Jolla big.
My brother rode a flexie down the Bonzai Pipeline, he said the was a spot they called “the showers” where there was always water showering down, he thought it was under the car wash on Pearl. But that would be too far out of the way. He told me, the Bonzai Pipeline started up at the foot of the hills at the bridle trail.